ATA files injunction papers over SoCal truck plan

ATA files injunction papers over SoCal truck plan    The nation's largest trucking trade association filed a request Wednesday with a Los Angeles federal court for a preliminary injunction blocking the implementation of an access licensing component contained in the two Southern California ports' $2.4 billion trucking re-regulation plan.
   The American Trucking Association, which filed suit against the cities and ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles on Monday, also asked the U.S. Circuit Court, Central Division to set an Aug. 25 hearing date and the court was expected to respond to the request Thursday.
   While Monday's filing detailed the basis of the ATA complaint against the two ports and their respective city halls, it did not include the formal request for an injunction. As part of the injunction request filing, the ATA presented the court with declarations of individual motor carriers that listed immediate costs and burdens they would face if the ports access license plan is allowed to go into effect.
   The ATA's suit filed Monday alleges that as a component of an underway truck replacement program, the two ports have developed an access license system that restricts trucker access to the ports. In attempting to implement the access licenses, according to the ATA, the cities and the two ports have violated federal laws and overstepped limited local ability by attempting to regulate interstate commerce.
   The access license component, said the ATA in the filing, is a 'textbook case of the need for federal pre-emption to prevent a patchwork of service-determining laws, rules and regulations.'
   The two cities and their two ports contend that the jointly developed truck plan, including the access licensing component, are an environmental plan aimed at substantially reducing truck pollution by forcing nearly 17,000 ports-servicing drivers to use trucks meeting stringent 2007 federal emission standards. Since mitigating the local impacts of the ports fall within the auspices of local authority, the two cities and port authorities argue they have jurisdiction to regulate the truckers entering the ports.
   In remarks since the ATA filing, the ports and city officials claim the ATA suit is an attempt to halt what they describe as groundbreaking environmental efforts, in the form of the truck plan, by the two cities.
   'It is disappointing that the ATA is seeking to impede this critical air quality initiative,' Port of Long Beach Executive Director Richard Steinke said in a release Monday, also stressing that the port intended to move forward with the plan despite the suit.
   Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said the lawsuit would not stop the truck plan from meeting its Oct. 1 start date. 'We are committed to rolling ahead with the world's most ambitious and bold plan to simultaneously green and grow a port,' he said.
   The ATA filing, however, only challenges the access license component of the truck plan and does not take issue with environmental components of the plan, such as a ban on older truck models and a $35-per-TEU container fee to pay for the truck replacements.
   Speaking out in support of ATA suit Monday, the California Trucking Association, which represents 3,600 motor carrier members statewide, said the truck plan would throw thousands of Southern California drivers out of work and shutter many small trucking firms.
   The ATA said Thursday it had been notified by its attorneys that the ports and cities have 10 business days to respond to the suit. The ATA would then have five business days to address the ports' and cities' responses. Only then, said the ATA, would a judge consider the injunction. ' Keith Higginbotham